Considerations for a Balanced

Scorecard of Leading and

Lagging Indicators for
Your Electrical Safety Program
LEADING AND LAGGING INDICATORS

By H. Landis “Lanny” Floyd II

LOST TIME ELECTRICAL INJURIES ARE AMONG reducing the risk of electrical injuries. The
the rarest injuries in the workplace, contribut- article will incorporate recent advance-
ing less than 0.2% of all workplace injuries in ments in regulatory guidance and volun-
the United States. Yet, contact with electrical tary standards in safety performance
energy is among the top 10 causes of occu- measurement. Specific references will
pational fatalities. These two attributes, include Work Safe Alberta, Lead-
very low frequency and very severe ing Indicators in Workplace Safety
consequence, create a serious chal- and Health (published in 2015)
lenge in measuring the effective- [20] and U.S. O c c u p a t i o n a l
ness of electrical safety programs. Safety and Health Adminis-
The traditional measurement tration (OSHA), Using Lead-
of injury rates, a lagging indi- ing Indicators to Improve
cator, may blind an orga- Safety and Health Out-
nization to future injury comes (p u b l i s h e d in
potential. The low fre- 2019) [15]. The article
quency of electrical will include a method
injuries may result for an organization
in an organization to benchmark cur-
having insuffi- rent metrics for
cient data points its electrical safety
to be statistically ©SHUTTERSTOCK.COM/IDEA.S program against
valid. This article advanced practices
ex­­plores opportuni- to measure and man-
ties to complement traditional methods age continual improvement.
of measuring safety performance with lead-
ing indicators to provide a balanced scorecard of lagging Introduction
and leading indicators to drive continual improvement in How do you measure the effectiveness of your electri-
cal safety program? Does the absence of injury equate
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MIAS.2021.3114640
to good safety? Every organization or business’s function
Date of current version: 6 January 2021 depends on metrics to enable better management decisions

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aimed toward achieving its goals eyes fixed on the rearview mirror
and objectives. “What are the right may have a clear view of the past
metrics?” is an essential question for No matter where journey, while a catastrophe may be
every profession and business func- looming ahead.
tion, and electrical safety is no differ-
an organization In the United States, lost time inju-
ent. Most safety professionals agree is in its electrical ries from exposure to electrical haz-
that metrics are essential components ards are low-frequency events. As
of effective safety management sys- safety management shown in Table 1, less than 0.2% or
tems as they help evaluate, moni- less than one in 500 occupational
tor, and control injury risk. Metrics
journey, there are injuries are from electric shock and
help assess the effectiveness of risk opportunities for arc flash exposures. Events that are
controls, identify potential injury low in frequency can mean that an
sources, support progress toward a more balanced organization does not have sufficient
achieving goals, and track trends internal data on electrical injuries to
over time.
scorecard of be statistically meaningful. Consider
In terms of workplace safety, met- electrical safety two companies with using TRIR as
rics are generally divided into lead- an indicator of the effectiveness of
ing indicators and lagging indicators. indicators. their respective electrical safety pro-
Lagging indicators, also known as grams. In the past two years, one
outcome indicators, typically exam- company has 100,000 employees and
ine after-the-fact issues and include experienced five OSHA-recordable
injury statistics employers must report to OSHA. On the injuries from exposure to electrical energy. The second
other hand, leading indicators tend to be measures of company has 350 employees and has not had an OSHA-
efforts to identify and reduce risk. There are no regula- recordable injury from electrical hazards in more than
tory requirements driving the use of leading indicators. five years. Which company has the more effective elec-
Leading and lagging metrics examine different types trical safety program? Which company is doing better
of data; each has advantages and disadvantages. For identifying and reducing risk? Looking at an individual
instance, because of consistent use across all industry, lag- worker in each of the two companies, which worker is
ging indicators that examine outcomes are usually better more likely to have an electrical injury? The answer is
for benchmarking. Leading indicators may lead to better not in the TRIR data. Due to the inherent low-frequency
intervention tools and can be indicators of future perfor- occurrence of electrical injuries, an individual or compa-
mance, but typically are uniquely designed for the context ny may not recognize the potential for a fatal (high conse-
in which they are applied. Thus, leading indicators may quence) injury and be blind to exposures and risk having
not candidates for benchmark comparison.

Limitations of Lagging Indicators

Total recordable incident rate (TRIR) is a standard safety
Table 1. Comparison of select nonfatal occupational
metric in the United States. It is defined as the number injuries in the United States, 2019
of work-related injuries per 100 full-time workers during
a one-year period. TRIR is a lagging indicator as it is a Number of
Type of Nonfatal Injury Injuries
measure of past performance. TRIR may not be an indi-
cator of future performance. Consider the following sce- Total 2,814,000
nario. An organization has not had an OSHA-recordable Sprains, strains, and tears 295,180
injury from electrical hazards for 365 days. On day 366, a
Musculoskeletal disorders 275,590
worker suffers an OSHA-recordable electric shock injury.
The one-year injury-free performance on day 365 changed Falls on same level 153,140
overnight. Did the effectiveness of its electrical safety Struck by object 134,620
program change overnight? How useful are the safety Falls to lower level 91,070
statistics on day 365 in predicting the likelihood of injury
Assault/violent act by person 30,090
on day 366? The answer is that past performance is not
a predictor of future performance. Sports teams do not Highway accidents 33,390
play by watching the scoreboard of past performance, and Assault/violent act by animal 14,390
automobile drivers do not drive with their eyes focused Electric shock and burn 1,900
on the rearview mirror. Knowing the first quarter’s score Fires and explosions 1,700
is important, but that likely will not tell the team what
Based on [1].
the score will be in the remaining quarters. A driver with

M AY /J UNE 2022 œ IEEE Industry Applications Magazine 17

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 high severity potential outcomes. The
very low frequency of electrical inci-
dents and the protentional for an Some leading
organization to be blind to the effec-
tiveness of its electrical safety program
indicators may be
underscore the need for a balanced more effective than
scorecard of leading and lagging indi-
cators for electrical safety. others, depending
An organization may have lead-
ing indicators at a high or broad
on an organization’s
level for its overall safety program. safety culture
Still, due to the infrequency of elec-
trical incidents, leading indicators and maturity.
for an overall safety program may
not be sufficiently focused on factors
critical to electrical hazard expo-
sures. No matter where an organization is in its electrical
safety management journey, there are opportunities for
a more balanced scorecard of electrical safety indicators.
For more than 50 years, thought leaders in safety manage-
ment have raised concerns with the limitations of depending
only on lagging indicators for safety management. Peter-
son examined studies from the 1970s in the United States,
Great Britain, and South Africa that showed a weak cor-
relation between past performance and future performance
[2]. Kaplan and Norton published a widely acclaimed book
on the topic in 1996 [3]. More recently, contemporary thought
leaders in advanced safety metrics, including Manuele,
Lopez, Esposito, and Walaski, have brought heightened
attention to a more balanced approach in designing and
applying leading and lagging indicators [4]–[7].
Advancements in Leading Indicators
The search for better methods and data to manage safety
programs has accelerated significantly in recent years.
Work Safe Alberta
In 2020, the provincial government of Alberta, Canada,
updated its publication Leading Indicators for Workplace
Health and Safety [8]. This document is a user’s guide of
what leading indicators are and how and why they might
be applied to strengthen your organization’s health and
safety culture and performance. Some leading indica-
tors may be more effective than others, depending on an
organization’s safety culture and maturity. For that reason,
the user guide considers three categories of performance:
those that are focused on maintaining compliance with
legislation, those looking for improvement (beyond com-
pliance), and those in pursuit of continuous learning for
the highest levels of performance. A tool is provided to
help establish which category best describes an organiza-
tion’s safety culture and performance.
American Society of Safety Professionals
The American Society of Safety Professionals (ASSP) has
highlighted advancements in metrics to manage safety
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programs better. The ASSP is providing
leadership and support to a revision
to ANSI Z16.1, Method of Recording
and Measuring Work Injury Expe-
rience. The revised standard, likely
to be published in 2021, will guide
designing a balanced approach using
leading and lagging indicators [9].
National Safety Council
Drawing from the experience of high
performing member companies of
the National Safety Council (NSC),
the Campbell Institute of the NSC
published a collection of research
papers to help organizations effec-
tively put leading indicators into practice to protect work-
ers [10]–[14]. The design and implementation guides
provide a comprehensive listing of leading indicators cate-
gorized by the maturity of an organization’s program and
the complexity of collecting and analyzing data. Included
are sample leading indicators for employers in the catego-
ries of education/awareness, reach, participation, satisfac-
tion, and organizational health.
OSHA
In 2019, OSHA created a website with resources aimed
at helping employers use lead indicators, along with tra-
ditional lagging indicators, to track workplace conditions
and events to prevent injuries before they occur and help
employers improve their safety programs. The resources
include a downloadable document with information on
the characteristics of useful leading indicators, finding
leading indicators in data that may already be collected,
and how to use leading indicators to improve parts of a
safety management program as well as an action plan
checklist [15].
Center for Chemical Process Safety
The Center for Chemical Process Safety (CCPS) is a
technology alliance sponsored by the American Insti-
tute of Chemical Engineers. In 2019, the CCPS updated
its guide for designing and implementing leading and
lagging indicators form managing the risk of hazard-
ous chemicals [16]. The guide differs from the previ-
ous references in that its focus is on a specific hazard.
In that regard, it provides an example of applying ge­­
neric guidance, found in the earlier references, to a
unique hazard.
A Balanced Scorecard
A common theme linking the resources discussed in the
“Advancements in Leading Indicators” section empha-
sizes that a combination of lagging and leading indicators
can provide a balanced scorecard for managing con-
tinual improvement in occupational safety management
(Figure 1). A balanced scorecard aims to provide insight
into an organization’s electrical safety initiatives. A bal-
anced scorecard involves combining leading indicators
with lagging indicators to develop a more comprehen-
sive assessment of electrical safety performance and
how it can be improved. Lopez, Esposito, Walaski, and
others are helping educate safety professionals in the
design and application of balanced scorecards for safety
management. Standard ANSI Z16.1, Method of Recording
and Measuring Work Injury Experience originated in the
1930s. The pending revision will reflect the evolution
and recent research impacting lagging and leading indi-
cators and the design and implementation of a balanced
safety metrics scorecard [9].
Hard Risk Versus Soft Risk
Risk can be a “hard” risk, such as the risk of electric
shock when working near an energized circuit. Risk can
also be a “soft” risk, such as the risk of having an ineffec-
tive incident investigation process. Hard risks tend to have
defining factors and statistical data that closely connect a
hazard to an undesirable outcome. For a person standing
within inches of an unguarded energized conductor, the
risk of suffering an electric shock is a hard risk. There is a
clear and present danger.
Soft risks are created by actions and decisions that are
distant in time from an exposure to a hard risk. The dan-
ger to a worker may not be clear and present. Soft risks
are much harder to make decisions about as they tend to
involve situations where the risk factors are unknown or
otherwise difficult to determine. Thus, the course of action
is difficult to decide. These generally take more planning
and implementation of extensive risk management applica-
tions to weigh what is known against the majority that is
not. A manager’s lack of support to approve a budget to
incorporate inherently safer designs in a capital project for
a new installation is a soft risk. The manager’s action will
impact the effectiveness in managing the risk of electrical
injury for the installation’s life, but the likelihood of injury
may be difficult to quantify [11].
As noted earlier, leading indicators tend to be mea-
sures of efforts to identify and reduce risk. Since hard
risks may be more visible and easier to quantify than soft
risks, identifying and understanding the relevance of soft
risk may provide significant opportunities for identifying
meaningful leading indicators.
Application to Electrical Safety
Electrical safety leaders should educate themselves on the
evolving body of knowledge in leading indicators and
help coach management leadership establish a balanced
scorecard of metrics that can more effectively serve the
organization in identifying and controlling the risk from
electrical hazards. In particular, leading indicators should
encompass all workers exposed to electrical hazards and
low-frequency/high-consequence exposures, as discussed
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by Gammon et al. and Brenner et al. [17], [18]. Specific
attention should be given to soft risks to identify useful
leading indicators. While TRIR may be a metric common-
ly used across most organizations, leading indicators may
need to be different for different organizations. Examples
of leading indicators of electrical safety program effective-
ness include the following:
1) the existence and vitality of electrical safety leadership
at the corporate, business unit, global region, and local;
organizational unit as appropriate
2) quality and effectiveness of electrical safety training for
electrical workers, nonelectrical workers, line supervi-
sion, and critical supporting resources; quality and
effectiveness of training are more challenging to mea-
sure than the frequency of when training was provided
3) the number of managers and supervisors trained in
electrical hazards awareness and the electrical safety
program’s role
4) frequency of program audits that examine the imple-
mentation of the organization’s electrical safety program
5) quality and frequency of management system audits
focused on preventing exposure to electrical hazards
6) the percentage of capital projects giving attention to
inherently safer design in the selection of hardware
and electrical system design
7) discipline in maintaining maintenance programs for
equipment and systems critical to electrical safety
8) the percentage of incident investigations that include
prevention through design solutions, as opposed to
more training, more procedures, and more personal
protective equipment.
This list provides a few examples when considering
potential leading indicators. Used together, the references at
the end of this article can help an organization select poten-
tial leading indicators and design a process for managing
effective implementation. The Work Safe Alberta publication
Leading Indicators for Workplace Health and Safety [20] and
the OSHA publication Using Leading Indicators to Improve
Safety and Health Outcomes [15] provide easy to use guid-
ance to help an organization expand its use of leading indi-
cators. As an example of their direction, Section 2.3 of the
FIGURE 1. A balanced collection of metrics includes leading
indicators that track improvements in risk reduction and lagging
indicators that measure results of risk reduction.
M AY /J UNE 2022 œ IEEE Industry Applications Magazine 19
 OSHA document guides defining leading indicators for each
of the following elements of safety management [10]:
●● management leadership
●● worker participation
●● hazard identification and assessment
●● hazard prevention and control
●● education and training
●● program evaluation and improvement
●● communication and coordination for host employers,
contractors, and staffing agencies.
As noted earlier, the leading indicators should be tightly
connected to electrical safety. For example, an organization
with a leading indicator measuring management/leadership
for overall safety and health needs to add a metric measur-
ing management/leadership for electrical safety. There may
be other specific hazards and risks for which management/
leadership support and commitment could be measured.
Conclusions
The relatively low frequency of electrical incidents can
blind an organization to risk reduction opportunities. Lag-
ging indicators tell us where we have been, but not where
we are going. Safety management experts and organiza-
tions championing new thinking in safety management
are pointing to innovations in designing better lagging
and leading indicators to create a balanced scorecard of
safety metrics. An organization may have leading indica-
tors at a high or broad level for its overall safety program.
Still, due to the infrequency of electrical incidents, lead-
ing indicators for an overall safety program may not be
sufficiently focused on factors critical to electrical hazard
exposures. No matter where an organization is in its elec-
trical safety management journey, there are opportunities
for a more balanced scorecard of electrical safety indicators.
Electrical safety leaders should embrace advancements
in safety metrics and develop a balanced scorecard tai-
lored to their unique work environment and management
culture, incorporating lagging and leading indicators to
help better manage continual improvement in identifying
and reducing hard and soft risk associated with exposure
to hazardous electrical energy.
An organization intent on controlling risk to as low as
reasonably practical should study the recent work explor-
ing leading indicators listed as references. Work Safe
Alberta, OSHA, and the Campbell Institute have provided
practical guidance to help an organization design and
implement meaningful metrics for reducing hard and soft
risks. A balanced scorecard of lagging and leading indi-
cators can enable measurable and long-lasting improve-
ments to electrical safety outcomes in the workplace.
Author Information
H. Landis “Lanny” Floyd II (h.l.floyd@ieee.org) is with
the University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham,
Alabama, 35294, USA, and Electrical Safety Group Inc., Elk-
ton, Maryland, 21921, USA. Floyd is a Life Fellow of IEEE.
20 IEEE Industry Applications Magazine œ MAY/J UNE 2022
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This article first appeared as “A Balanced Scorecard of
Leading and Lagging Indicators for Your Electrical Safety
Program” (doi: 10.1109/ESW45993.2021.9461566) at the
2021 IEEE IAS Electrical Safety Workshop. This article was
reviewed by the IAS Electrical Safety Committee.
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